EP 53: From Chapel Hill To Corporate with Nora Elsayed

Listen as Raven Heyward, founder and host of DiversifyHER, converses with Nora Elsayed. Nora, is a field marketer at IBM in New York City, where she shapes go‑to‑market strategy at the intersection of tech, brand, and community.  A UNC Kenan‑Flagler graduate and Luther Hodges Scholar, she’s also the founder of Girl Boss Gatherings and Evenin’ Out The Playin’ Field—two organizations focused on connection, confidence, and equity. Her Sudanese‑American identity, bilingual background, and love for art and sport shape her work. In 2023, she published her debut poetry collection What’s Left of Me, and she remains a devoted FC Barcelona fan.

Connect with Nora!
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nora-elsayed101/

Transcript

Season Kickoff And Guest Introduction

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Hello everyone, and welcome back to a new season of Diversify Her Podcast. I'm your host, Raven Hayward, and today I'm super excited to have one of my closest friends, Nora El Said. Today she is coming on. It's been a long-awaited episode. It's been four years in the making. And Nora is a UNC 20 class of 2025 graduate, and she is a field marketer at IBM in New York City, where she shapes go-to-market strategy at the intersection of tech, brand, and community. At UNC Keenan Flagler, and she was a UNC Luther Hodges scholar, she also was the founder of Girl Boss Gatherings and Evening Out the Playing Field, which are two organizations that focus on connection, confidence, and equity. Her Sudanese American identity, bilingual background, and love of art and sport shape her work. In 2023, she published her debut poetry collection, What's Left of Me, and she remains a devoted FC Barcelona fan. And so, as two UNC Keenan Fogler graduates who helped to build black women in business together, I thought that it would be fun to catch up, except this time we're talking about how life is post-Chapel Hill. And so, Nora, you're over a year into corporate America. And while I'm only a few months in, being a recent grad back in May, I wanted this episode to really just feel like advice to my future self, but also everyone else who's kind of navigating this transition alongside me. And you can just share your journey and your experience as to how Chapel Hill has shaped you. But even going a bit before Chapel Hill, I'd love for you to just expand on your background from high school and what led you to UNC and how you ended up at IBM now.

SPEAKER_00 1:53

Yeah, of course. Thank you so much for having me, Raven. I have literally been begging Raven to be on this podcast, I think, since the day that I found out that she owned it. It is such a cool concept. And I think all the other episodes you've had with amazing women in business and other kind of ventures, I've loved and enjoyed. So being a part of it now is it's truly an honor. So thank you for choosing me. I am so excited to talk to you about all things post-grad because we're we're in the same boat now, girl. We had our, we had a we were always a year apart, me and Raven, but we always kind of shared notes and past insights to each other and et cetera. And I told men, I told Raven this all the time. Like she does rem, she reminds me of myself, even though we're a year apart. And I think with her as well, like she has so many things that inspire me, and I have so many things, you know, that she was inspired by. So it's just it's great to sit down and talk always.

SPEAKER_01 2:38

Yes, I'm really excited.

High School Curiosity And Team Sports

SPEAKER_01 2:40

And so to take us back, let's start all the way from the beginning. So before IBM and Corporate America, and even before UNC Chapel Hill, talk us through who you were in high school and what you were involved in and what kind of inspired you to want to pursue business and eventually end up to what you're doing now.

SPEAKER_00 3:01

Yeah, of course. So I grew up in Maryland, um, in Montgomery County, if anybody's familiar, I attended Richard Montgomery High School, Go Rocket, and I had like the best time at that school. I think for me personally, looking back, I would say I've been pretty consistent. I've been kind of the same person throughout my entire life, somebody who's very, very curious. I was a part of so many different things from newspaper to sports to diversity programs to academic societies, etc. I was in a magnet school as well. So I had all those different elements going on for me, and I absolutely loved it. I loved being multifaceted. I loved being able to learn from people who enjoy different things. I love being able to even dip my toe into the arts. You mentioned my book earlier, Raven, and I started writing it in high school. So I was doing all those things, you know, in that very short amount of time. I think one of the one of the few things that I did in high school that I didn't really get to continue in the same way in college was sports. I played field hockey, lacrosse, and soccer. And I would say, now looking back, that was really what kind of pushed me to business, which is kind of a weird parallel there. Um, and I'll explain kind of how that comes about. But I think a lot of the soft skills that I learned that I now use in my corporate job, and I was able to even use in college to do things like network and et cetera, came from my time playing team sports. It came from my time being a leader in those sports, communicating, being coached, being able to receive feedback and then go onto the field and actually enact that feedback was like miles beyond anything that I was honestly taught in a classroom or sat down with. Obviously, you learn all the technical hard skills to those AP or IB classes, the diversity that I was surrounded by as well inspired a lot of those programs that you mentioned. Um, Raven. So I truly had like a plethora of experiences. I feel like any club I could join in high school, I was a part of. Any friend group I could tag along to lunch with, I was a part of. And I think that curiosity is something, it's like that thread that just keeps on going in my life. So I'm glad that, you know, college was sort of this final kind of creation of all of those elements of myself. And it led me to my way of marketing. So as I mentioned, you know, with the sports and with those soft skills I learned and with the all the other activities I was doing, I was looking for some sort of career that would allow me to still do those things. You know, you'll feel like at least for me as a first generation American, I was kind of going down and checking off the boxes of whether I want to be a doctor, a lawyer, an engineer. And none of those, they like none of them sound satisfying or interesting to me. It felt like I was had to choose this very one strict lane and wanted something a little bit more general and a little bit more open, but also had a little bit more autonomy and creativity. And I found that within the world of business, creating business and you know, meeting people, talking to people, understanding what people want to buy or see or et cetera. And that's kind of how I delved into marketing. It wasn't, you know, as easy as I'm saying it to you now, Raven, but I think it kind of really shaped throughout, you know, my last two years in high school, but then joining Keenan Flagler and all the other programs I was a part of there kind of really helped color in what I wanted out of my career.

SPEAKER_01 6:10

Yes, definitely. And I kind of have a similar sentiment when thinking of business. I think I sort of thought it was just okay, if I do business, I'm either gonna do marketing or it's either gonna be consulting or it's either gonna be finance. You really just think that it it's kind of like this one lane sort of field. But it's really very multidimensional whenever you think of business. If business is involved in everything, and you can always, of course, people talk about going off and starting their own business and utilizing entrepreneurship. But I'm very appreciative of kind of the fact that both you and I have gone into corporate America so we can kind of get some skin in the game and learn and actually, you know, all these things that we've learned about in Keenan Flagler, and we've been taught and told now we're actually being able to use those skills into the workforce. And even just the network of Keenan Flagler as a whole, it makes me proud. Like whenever I tell people what school I'm coming from, they automatically think, oh, Keenan Fagler, like that's such a good school. So I'm happy to, you know, I'm proud to be at Sardhill. And so speaking of Keenan Flagler, I know both you and I were assured admits. We also were part of the Luther Hodges program, and we also were both on the Community Equity and Inclusion Board, also known as CEI. And your

Choosing Marketing For Creativity

SPEAKER_01 7:30

sophomore year, which is my freshman year, you actually ended up curating the very first black woman in business. And that is an event that is now hosted annually, typically between February and March, um, that the CEI board puts on. And I've been very proud to be a part of the first one. And you know, we've continued to do it every year, and I'm looking forward to it coming up hopefully next year in the spring of 2027. But looking back, what experiences or organizations really pushed you to think of that event or to want to have that event and create that safe space for young black women in business?

SPEAKER_00 8:11

Yeah, I think, I mean, Raven, you know Chapel Hill just as much as I do. And I think that entire community just pushes you to be the best version of yourself. I think I always tell people now when I'm talking about, you know, who I am or giving them my elevator pitch and they ask me, where are you from? I add Chapel Hill as one of my hometowns because that's how much it really means to me. And I think when I first joined, and I was kind of looking for, you know, the communities that look like me, that have the same interests as me, et cetera. And especially in the business school, as you mentioned, we were shared admits. We were there from day one, which was a huge advantage that I'm so grateful for. But I had sort of the one kind of miss for me was I wasn't finding women, black women that looked like me in the rooms that I was in. I was also finding the ones that I, you know, was communicating with and did able, you know, to network with via LinkedIn or alumni or et cetera. They had so much knowledge that they just wanted to share, but they had no kind of avenue to share it. And I did as well. Even if I was, you know, stepping into Keenan Flaggler day one or day two, there were things that I knew that, you know, another woman at the business school didn't know. And I wanted to kind of open up those gates. I think the first thing I told you, Raven, was the reason why I started this was because I felt like there was a lot of information that was gate kept. And I think especially in the realm of business, because of how wide open it is and all the different career paths and et cetera, there are so many things that are on a if you know, you know basis. And I think the one thing I wanted to do was just completely break that and make sure that we were exchanging information and passing notes to each other and keeping each other, you know, in the know for the things that are happening with the different career options. I think, especially as black women and especially in corporate America, there was such a need for it. I think it's a lot easier to be able to do that and speak, you know, vulnerably and honestly when you're with people that know your experiences on an identity level. I think that's very, very, very important. I was very grateful that Keenan Flagler embraced that. And there was already kind of an infrastructure there to have something like this happen. The CEI board that you mentioned, the community equity and inclusion board was the perfect kind of jump pad for that. And then there were women within the B school that were such champions of this that I was able to leverage. Of course, there was a Raven Hayward that I was like, we got to do this together. Um, but there was also staff members like Mahogany Persep or Catherine Okafour, Shamoul, Jackie, so many people that were just like, this is an incredible idea. You know, here's the money, here's the venue, here's the this. There was the hunted woman organization as well. So I think I would say I was the lucky one to be able, you know, I had this idea, but it was really the people in the community that helped us bring it together. And that all cultivated from just coming in day one and me trying to find who can I sit with that I I know, you know, I can be able to kind of chat to a little bit and see what they're doing and be able to, you know, feel a little friendly. Because I think for anybody that experiences an undergraduate business school, it's it is very competitive and it gets very cold sometimes. That isn't on purpose. The people are incredible, but I think the environment and the wanting to get a job and wanting to get an internship, and it really is a couple hundred kids all vying for the same exact, you know, companies and career paths and money that make it that way. So I think being able to be in a room for just a couple hours and kind of let all that go and share what you know and hopefully take something back was really, really helpful to me. And it was incredible to see, you know, my first year and then see you take it on after I graduate and then this becoming an annual thing. I mean, there is nothing better than seeing, you know, something that you enjoyed so much be continued and be enjoyed by other women. So that was just an absolute joy.

SPEAKER_01 11:38

Yeah, I completely agree. And I also think that something that, you know, I've talked about on my podcast before. We even talked about in those intimate settings is just imposter syndrome and being in spaces where you don't necessarily see people who look like you, of course, it can make you kind of feel almost inferior and you're nervous about okay, like, do I belong? Am I smart enough? Was I just, you know, a DEI add-on? Like, how do I really fit here? And then something that I've also learned to appreciate and learn is like the importance of having allies. And just because someone doesn't look like you doesn't necessarily mean that they're not rooting for you. And that's something that I also learned throughout Keenan Faggler of just even having our cohort group amongst the AAPs, but also Shamul and Amy and Jackie, like being there to help curate us, and even Michael Penny, like working out yes, shout out Michael Penny of him, you know, working with the undergraduate students and really pouring into us, or even Felix having him there my freshman year, and like just remembering how important it was to have people in your corner, and like they don't always have to look like you or necessarily even share your same views on every single thing. But as long as you know, y'all at the core have you know the same sentiment and have the same goal of okay, I'm gonna pour as much into you as I can so that way you can venture out and you can, you know, take advantage of all the opportunities that we have at bay. I think that that's something that's really important, and something that I always try to encourage other people to do is just take advantage of all the opportunities that you have at hand because you never know who you're gonna meet, you never know who you're gonna impact or who's gonna impact you. And so I feel that with us, you know, being such high achieving young women, sometimes, you know, we set these milestones or we set these ideas in our head of what we want to accomplish. So we're always thinking, you know, okay, what's our five-year plan? Okay, what are we gonna tackle this year? And so graduation, it feels like this huge finish line, right? It's like we've been talking about going to college and graduating since elementary school, and then now that it's happened, you know, that's when real life starts. And that's what I'm kind of in the phase of right now, you know. It hasn't even been six months since I've graduated yet. I haven't even hit the half-year mark yet. And yeah, I feel that I'm already kind of twiddling my thumbs and like, okay, in my job, I'm not necessarily being graded. There is no going back to school time. Like, we're in August, people are about to start school, and I'm just like, okay, I'm not

Building Black Women In Business

SPEAKER_01 14:20

going back to Chapel Hill. I'm still gonna be at my job. It's no longer an internship, this is full time. So, what was your transition like from college to corporate America? And what were some things that you expected that maybe didn't go your way, or what were some things that kind of took you by surprise?

SPEAKER_00 14:39

Oh my god, that transition was insane thinking about it from last year. I was, I remember at first I was so overwhelmed because there's so much going on in such like a very tight period. One, for a lot of people, you're moving to a completely new city. Um, for me, I was moving from North Carolina, Maryland to New York City. And it wasn't just like a move where I was doing like my little cute NYU dorm and I was interning. Like, no, you have an apartment. It's completely bare bones. You're getting, you know, even plates and cutlery. Like, I couldn't remember the last time I went really furniture shopping in that way. Um, and you're signing a year lease and it's bills, it's just very adult. I think that was very overwhelming to kind of take those, you know, that safeguard of being a student away. And now it's like this is a full kind of thing, like you just mentioned. And then the second part of that was again the corporate job. Now the responsibility becomes 10x. It's not just an internship for three months where you're doing a project and you're presenting it and you have mentors and help and support, but you know, you're really now helping drive whether that's revenue, change, visibility, etc., for a big company, if you're in the case of you and I, for example. So I think that was very daunting to me. I think going from an internship to the full-time, even though you had that experience, you know, just getting to know the company and getting familiar with some people, I knew it was going to be massively different. And I didn't necessarily know exactly what I was gonna expect my first day. I couldn't really tell you what I was gonna do day to day and what my actual deliverables were look like and et cetera. And just even like the cadence of how you speak in corporate or how you interact with people, it's not the same way that you would with professors or classmates or et cetera. And I think for me, I was trying to find the common, you know, parallels and trying to move things from that period of my life to now to help myself kind of adjust. And I realized that was not the case, particularly in B2B marketing, when you're marketing business to business. I think for me, one of the things that I expected, but didn't necessarily go my way was that was the communication, was understanding those little tiny nuances and words and things that they don't necessarily give you in your onboarding pamphlet. You just kind of learn on the go. And, you know, very quickly I was able to kind of catch them, but it takes a really large learning curve. I think the worst feeling ever is being in a room and not knowing what people are talking about or thinking that they're speaking in a different language when obviously they're speaking English, but there's so many acronyms and very technical terms and etc. and little ways that they say things that everybody in the room gets, but you don't, and raising your hand to ask a question is just it is so hard to do. I think in college it's encouraged. I'm, you know, was always putting my hand up of something I wasn't understanding because we were all there to learn. In my mind, I falsely believed that being in a corporate setting or having a full-time job, I wasn't there to learn. I was there to work and I had to know what I was doing and saying. So I wasn't raising my hand in those first couple weeks or first couple months on the job. I think over time I started to realize that the best way to approach corporate is doing both at the same time. It is working while learning, and it is learning while working. Um, and I think that's something that took me some time to get there. I think when you have great mentors and great managers and great teammates, you can get there a lot quicker. I 100% did. Um, and it's also speaking up. I was telling people what I was feeling. I was telling them that I'm so scared to ask a question. I'm so scared to ask what this acronym means, but I'm like, I'm spending hours searching for it and it's taking me that much longer to do my work. And then being like, oh no, Nora, this is normal. I had the exact experience. I joined and I didn't know what this little acronym meant. But raise your hand, ask that. And I think also realizing that asking questions is a good thing. Um, I think a lot of times when you think of corporate, you're thinking, you know, what is the best way that I can be presentable and then also be liked by the people that I'm working with? That's always everyone's first thought. I think that's a natural first thought. I don't think anybody should be ashamed of wanting to be liked. And I think because of that, I wasn't, you know, asking those questions. I wanted everybody to think that I was the new hire that was on top of it and knew everything. But I think asking those questions made my teammates, it made my manager and made the people I was working with realize that I'm here to work and I'm excited to work and I'm curious about my work and I care about my work. I think that you show that you care and you show that excitement through being curious and through asking those questions. So it is a it is a big transition. I'm saying it's much easier said than done because this was kind of a year-long process. And I can't even say now that I'm a year and some in that I know everything or that I'm the per best at it. There are still times where I'm like, oh my God, I'm a year in, I shouldn't be asking this. And I kind of hype myself up to get to that point. I think you know, it's also important to build those, you know, teammates and communities and et cetera, within work in the same way that you do in college, those kind of quote unquote safe people that you can go to and ask those dumb questions. So a lot of that kind of carries on in parallels as well, um, which is really interesting.

SPEAKER_01 19:27

Yes, like as you're talking, I'm like heavily nodding because I'm completely agreeing with everything you're saying. I think definitely at Visa, they throw around so many acronyms, and I am really quick to send a ping over to someone that's in the meeting privately be like, hey, what does this stand for? And in a similar fashion to how I used to do in college, I could always kind of put things on like, oh, I'm a freshman, like, oh, it's okay, I'm a freshman. And so I kind of have the same mindset. Now I'm like, I'm only a month in, like, it's okay, I'm only a month in. But it's also different because I interned at the same company. So it's there's things that I obviously am picking up on or I'm remembering from last summer, but then I'm getting told, yeah, that's the way we did it last year. Now it's a different process. So even having to pick up on that learning curve of just realizing how fast corporate America can change or will move, and they'll say, like, oh, you know, we were doing that, but right after you left, we changed it to the system. So I'm automatically like, okay, like I'm glad to know, but sometimes it's a bit stressful at times because obviously I want to perform well, I want to, you know, make my manager proud, and I don't want to see him, you know, like I'm pestering them and asking them every single little question. So trying to navigate that, but also I think outside of work has been another area that I'm sort of trying to rediscover myself and something that I don't think that necessarily a lot of people had to experience is like if you were an in-state student, you know, you could go home as like much as you wanted, or maybe like your home was two hours away. But for me, the case was I was only 20 minutes down the road. So now that I'm moved down and I'm like a five-hour drive from home, I'm sort of having to adjust the way people did maybe their freshman year in college, or maybe like their first couple of years in college where they weren't used to being away from home, or like myself, like living alone and you know, even being nervous to disclose like, do I tell people I live alone? Do I tell people I have a roommate? Because you know, for safety reasons

The Shock Of Full Time Work

SPEAKER_01 21:40

and being in a big city, and so you know, I'm sort of speaking from the experience of now I'm learning that adjustment period, but you got to kind of experience that your freshman year, or thus you entering college. So, what were some things that maybe you had to do or you realized would help you if you ever like became homesick or you realized, like, oh me. And I really am out here like all alone.

SPEAKER_00 22:03

Yeah, I think one of those big things, the homesickness was so real. Cause I think that period of time, especially your freshman year, was your first time really kind of moving away from home, especially after COVID. You were so used to home and family and et cetera on an even greater level. But I think one of the big things was finding the people. It was really, really the communities. I remember my freshman year, I was so lucky I was a part of the assured admin group. So I had that community. I also tried to find other people that had similar interests. So it was to joining student organizations, et cetera. And it was also having, you know, my roommates and looking for community and people in that aspect. I think the great thing about freshman year is everybody is on that same energy of like trying to find friends and putting themselves out there. As anxiety-inducing as it is, you're kind of in the same boat with all these people who are really trying to, you know, do that and make friends and find people that they can do lunch with or do a study date with or et cetera. So that to me was huge. It was being able to know who I can go to, being able to have people that I can talk to about, you know, my homework, but then also just talk to about our plans for the weekend or going to the mall or et cetera. Now in my, you know, post-grad in New York City. It's honestly been very similar to that case. I think even more so because you don't necessarily have this cohort that you're coming in with, or, you know, that freshman year group of people who are in your same classes or et cetera. Um, it's kind of the world being your oyster. And so a lot of that does cause even more anxiety, causes a lot of loneliness for people post-grad, which is something that I didn't realize. I was like, oh, I'm moving to like New York City and I have a roommate and I have all these people from Chapel Hill coming with me. But everybody's on such different paths. You know, you're not meeting up on campus anymore or going to the quad or doing lunch at, you know, the dining halls or going to Keenan Flagler for 408, etc. But instead, you know, somebody's working nine to five, somebody's, you know, doing this, somebody's running a marathon, somebody's getting married and having kids. Like everybody is on such different avenues and paths, etc. So it's really trying to find the pockets of where you can meet those people where they're at, but then also looking elsewhere and looking beyond that community that you've already built and finding people within the city that you're in. And that could be, you know, a lot of solo adventures and a lot of solo dates. It's getting very comfortable with yourself. And I always tell people like my number one advice for post-grad in dealing with that is learning to love yourself and then going to those places that um you enjoy and that help you love yourself, and then finding people that are in that same path. So if yoga makes you feel really happy or if going to the gym makes you feel really happy, go there and go often and then meet people in those spaces. I think when you're in a space that you already feel comfortable, it's a lot easier to strike conversation or you know, tap somebody on the shoulder and say, Hey, like you've come here a couple of times, I'm Nora, I'm this, etc. So it's all, it's all a learning path. And I think for a lot of people it looks a lot different. Um, but for me, that's that's kind of how it's looked.

SPEAKER_01 24:49

Yeah, I think I'm basically like on your same wavelength of trying to almost like quote unquote date myself. Like figure out, okay, what do I enjoy doing? What do I like to do? And also something that has really been getting to me is just how expensive everything is. So while I'm finding things that I like to do, okay, maybe what's a more cost-effective way to go about this. And so something that I look forward to doing like every Saturday morning is discovering like a new coffee shop and going there and like ordering a drink and reading my book because I finally have been able to get back into reading for pleasure and for fun rather than reading for an assignment or reading something because I have to write about it, and so that's been like little pockets of peace and happiness that I've been able to find along my journey, but also, of course, like keeping myself centered and grounded and making sure that I'm journaling and also talking to my family as often as I can and going to church, and so something that I've really made sure to prioritize is my mental health. I think we hear about it all the time of how sometimes corporate can really be taxing on a lot of people, but it also depends just on the field that they go into and the hours that they're working. And I've always seen funny TikToks about how people will joke like Gen Z, you definitely won't catch them on their computers past five, or you know, little jokes like that. But I want to know just within your experience of having a year under your belt, how have you been able to effectively still prioritize, you know, your mental sanity and peace, but also making sure that you're showing up and presenting your best work your job.

SPEAKER_00 26:28

Yeah, I think that sentiment is so real. I've heard it so many times of the stereotype of Gen Zers at work and you know, just us being very no-centered and being very work-life balanced, etc. And we don't have that hard work. I would say it's it's a stereotype. Like I wouldn't necessarily agree with it, but I do think the one thing about Gen Z is we are, you know, we do prioritize our mental health and our bodies and our social well-being and et cetera, which I do think is a great thing, probably more so than previous generations. I think we're just more knowledgeable about it, and so it's just more front of mind. I think also we've had more conversations and it's become more normalized, which I think is exactly the whole point of those conversations and all the campaigns and everything that has been going on. Um so I find that to be a positive thing. And if that's the share stereotype that comes with it, I mean, we'll take it, why not? Um, but there is a balance. I think, you know, there is times where you could probably sit in your computer from, you know, 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. and and continue working in those things that need to be done. But I think it's understanding and prioritizing. Um, a lot of that comes with just being organized. I think, you know, the work never ends, it will never end. You can sit in your computer for 24 hours and work, you know, it's huge companies, it's always something to do, but it's, you know, keeping yourself organized, it's maintaining a calendar. And then it's also making sure that you have, you know, scheduled things in. I think a lot of the time what I was trying to do when I first moved is like be spontaneous and be fun. I think a lot of times when you work a nine to five, it's really hard to be spontaneous because things get in the way. And I think there are some times where work has to take priority just because of, you know, where you're at in the company or where things are happening. And I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing. I think a lot of times, you know, companies are looking for hard workers. I know you, you know, as well as I know myself, um, Raven, we do love to care about our work. We love about we love to do, you know, everything that we're working on, we take a lot of pride in it. We want to make sure that it's done in the best fashion. So there are days where I'm like, today I need to lock in for work, and if that means staying extra, I'm gonna stay extra. But when you have things scheduled and you have things, you know, social activities penciled into your calendar, whether that's going to the gym, whether that's, you know, hanging out with a friend, watching a movie, etc., you're able to work around those. You're able to say, Tuesday, you know, I can stay later, but you know, Wednesday, I'm locked in on leaving at 4:30 or leaving at five.

Making Friends After College

SPEAKER_00 28:40

But here's how I can make up for that in other ways. So if you're organized and you're able to kind of see your week, you know, at a glance in a, you know, very quickly on that Monday morning, you know, you can you can do that. You're able to prioritize and put. I think for a lot of the people that I see that struggle to do that is people who couldn't tell you what they're doing the next day and you know, who aren't organized with the things they're doing. Um, so a lot of times when a social plan does come up or something for work comes up, they're frazzled, you know, they don't know necessarily how to handle it in the best way. Um, and they're trying to look for those kind of outs. And I think that can really mess with your mental health because then you could spend days and days sitting, you know, either working at home or working in an office and not seeing people and not discussing anything other than, you know, the project that you're working on at work, which I don't necessarily think is the best thing, obviously, for your mental health. So it requires a lot of little things. I think it's something that people it takes years and years to learn. I think even now I'm still working on my work-life balance and how that works and how I'll be able to, you know, put the two and prioritize, you know, both of them at the same time. But, you know, over time when your schedule starts to, you know, you start to understand your work and your things better and your flow and everything, you're able to really kind of put, you know, pen to paper and make those things happen. I think now being a year in, if you looked at my schedule week one, you'll be like, How are you doing this? But now I understand kind of all four seasons and how things are gonna look like, you know, in my year, in my three months, and my six months. And also a big part of that is giving yourself grace when things come up and being, you know, just communicative about it, whether that's things coming up in your personal life where you need to take off of work for, or things coming up at work where you need to, you know, inform whoever you need to inform about, you know, that so you know it's a little, it's a little bit of both.

SPEAKER_01 30:22

Yeah, definitely. And I think I love that you brought up the organization aspect because that has been something that's really helped me. Is I'm the type of person I will literally go on my team's calendar and put like work on this, work on this, work on that. Like I'll literally map it into my calendar so I have a set to-do list. And so that's something that I'm able to do. Like once I get to work, I kind of knock out what I want to do, and then at the end of the day, I see what I accomplished, and then maybe what I need to circle back to when I go back to my home. Because a big thing that I was really looking forward to postgrad was not having homework or being able to leave work at work. I think that's one of the things that honestly stressed me out so much about college, is I felt like the work was never done. Like you would we'd have lecture and then you'd have to meet with your group outside of class. You'd have to do homework outside of class, you'd have to study outside of class. Even some exams would be outside of class hours, like busy 410, our exam would be from 4 to 7 p.m. Like that is outside of class. And so that was something that I was really looking forward to now being in corporate. I could leave work at work and come home and decompress. And even with me being able to work from home, I still have my desk area where I do all my work.

Protecting Mental Health With Structure

SPEAKER_01 31:40

Like I'm very big on, I don't take any meetings from my couch, not even my island in my kitchen. Like, I need to make sure I'm leaving work in one space. And I think that's something that's really been helping me out. And I also love the sentiment you brought about giving yourself grace. And obviously, it's something that we hear all the time. I've even talked about it in my past episodes, and guests have talked about it, but you can talk about it all you want until you actually have to sit there and live through that experience. And so I kind of was humbled, or I wouldn't say humbled, it was divine alignment, as my mom says. But you know, being in my car accident back in February, that really reminded me, okay, I'm it's okay if everything's not perfect right now. It's okay if you know this mental timeline that I had in my head, clearly that's not the way that this is going right now. So I have to be able to readjust and adapt. And that's something that you know they're always looking for in the workplace because corporate America, it changes like this all the time. Like there's constantly layoffs, or you know, whatever the market is doing or the economy. So you have to be able to be adaptable, but also still be focused and like calm enough to keep your composure and navigate and know what you're doing. Because a lot of the times, too, they'll say, even if you don't know what you're doing, act like you know what you're doing. And it's okay to still ask questions, but you know, you have to have some sort of confidence that like exudes as you're talking. And then given you brought up the point of with your mental health and your sanity, also making sure that you know you're being communicative and you're being transparent and finding that safe person in your job that you can, you know, be vulnerable with, but also people talk a lot about, you know, making sure you separate your social friends from your work friends and like you don't tell people too much of your business because they can use that against you. So learning all of these things and like how to navigate it, I think I've really appreciated, you know, you being open and honest and sharing your experience. And I'm looking forward to, of course, like staying up to date with you and seeing how our careers progress along the years. And so as I come to the end of my episode, I have a signature question that I ask how much is what is one piece of advice you would give someone to go out and diversify themselves?

SPEAKER_00 33:58

I think the one piece of advice I would give people to go out and diversify themselves is staying curious. I think don't just look at, you know, what you're doing in the moment or what your job is or what's going on with that. I think be curious, ask your friends what they're doing at their job, ask, you know, your neighbors, say hello to the people around you, et cetera, especially if you're a post-grad. Um, you want to understand the world around you. And I think that also helps a lot of that loneliness that I was talking about earlier. Um, it's what's helped me, it's what has allowed me to get out of my shell, be more extroverted. Um, it's being curious about other people, being curious about what's going on even within my own company, what's going on in the sports world and politics, etc. I think curiosity goes such a long way. It is one of those soft skills that keep on giving. The more you ask, you keep on getting. And I think the more you put into it, also the more that you get back from it. A lot of the things that I know and a lot of the experiences that I've, you know, been so privileged to hear have been things and the lessons that I've, you know, taken across my entire life. I think also curiosity has allowed me to be in rooms I never thought I was gonna be in, has allowed me to get things from work or, you know, from other kinds of experiences, you know, and being able to have those in my life, especially when you're in a major city like Atlanta for you, Raven, or New York City for me. You just never know who's around and you never know who's listening or who's there or what they've been through or what their experiences are. So when you're able to share your story by being curious about somebody else's, it just makes life all that more fulfilling and fruitful. So yeah, thank you so much for having me, Raven.

SPEAKER_01 35:24

Yes, thank you so much. You definitely dropped some golden nuggets, and I just appreciate you know all the advice that she gave and the sentiments, and like I think it's so cool to see that we're living the experiences that we used to talk about. Like, I remember you saying, Oh, before I'm in New York, I'm so excited you this, and like now you're actually doing it, or even me talking about moving to Atlanta and being so excited, and so we're actually like living out our dreams and the things that we craved for, and I think that that's something that we definitely cannot take for granted, especially in this job climate and just knowing how hard it is to even obtain a job, and so it's a blessing that we're able to provide for ourselves when we go into establishments where we're not dreading every single day. So I think that that is really something to be happy and blessed for. And so thank you so much for coming on. Again, this is four years in the making. I'm so excited. Yes, I know, and everyone, thank you so much for tuning in. I'll be sure to include more contact information or link to it if you want to reach out to her, get connected. I appreciate you all for listening, and I'll catch you on the next episode.